Failed designs for Liverpool go on show at Riba centre

Mann Island, which houses the centre, won a RIBA North West award in 2015

Designs for Liverpool that were never built are going on show at a newly-opened national architecture centre in the city.

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) centre is housed in the Broadway Malyan-designed Mann Island on the waterfront

RIBA North has a gallery "at its heart", showing the city's architectural past, present and future.

Mayor Joe Anderson said it would bring "new tools and innovations".

Graeme Shankland's city centre panorama from 1963 is framed by St George's Hall on the left and the museum and library on the right

The gallery includes an interactive 3D digital city model which will help "improve planning and engage with communities and industry about developing our cities in a way that we will be proud of in the future," Mr Anderson added.

Among the designs that never came to fruition are Sir Charles Nicholson and Philip Webb's proposals for the city's Anglican Cathedral, a 1959 scheme by Sir Denys Lasdun for the Catholic Cathedral site and Graeme Shankland's "bold vision for a new skyline" from the 1960s.

Visitors will also walk through layers of red mesh cut into the shapes of iconic buildings in "northern powerhouse" cities, including The Sage in Gateshead, Imperial War Museum North, Liverpool Catholic Cathedral and York Minster.

The Liverpool(e) Mover, Shaker, Architecture Risk Taker exhibition, the title of which refers to how the city's name was spelt until the 18th Century, has been funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

It runs until 16 September.

This imaginative drawing of a single-arched bridge from Gambier Terrace to the cathedral was made by Johnson Marshall in his second year at the Liverpool School of Architecture

The distinctive roof for Liverpool Catholic Cathedral designed for a competition in 1959 by Denys Lasdun was probably intended to be built of concrete